Also
"
Doctors say the patient is stable - but "an enormous number" of worms in his body are contaminating his wounds and making his situation worse.
His condition is thought to give a rare insight into life in North Korea.
"I've never seen anything like this in my 20 years as a physician," South Korean doctor Lee Cook-jong told journalists, explaining that the longest worm removed from the patient's intestines was 27cm (11in) long.
"
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42021373
That's because Dear Leader told the farmers to use human waste to fertilize their crops, since there wasn't enough animal waste. Also I read that much of the time they didn't dry or cure it first. As a result it's probable that the worm/parasite problem is now endemic to most of the DPRK population.
At this point I'm honestly curious why we don't just start "motivating" the current population of the country to dispose the current regime under the promise of a better future, rather then making them cling to them with the threat of a military invasion.
A great book on life in NK is "Without You There Is No Us" by Suki Kim. Kim pretended to be a missionary school teacher and she taught the children of some of North Korea's elite for two school years. The length of her stay and the fact that she's Korean provide a ton more insight into NK's culture than you're average Vice documentaries ever could.